


Stuck in Vegas

by rameau



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vegas, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-06
Updated: 2017-03-06
Packaged: 2018-09-28 17:32:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10141715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rameau/pseuds/rameau
Summary: John Sheppard lives to save another day, but there's only one life he wants to save and it's not his own. It never was.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OCDindeed](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OCDindeed/gifts), [OCDindeed (McShipIt)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/McShipIt/gifts).



> Better late than never, right? 
> 
> My gratitude to [bookjunkie1975](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookjunkie1975/pseuds/bookjunkie1975) and [fardareismai2](http://archiveofourown.org/users/fardareismai2) for their invaluable comments from 2016 and stellar beta work in 2017.

_"You're stuck with me."_

Rodney opened his eyes to Woolsey standing at the door. "What?" 

"The cleaning crew is on site. They found a body."

Rodney nodded to avoid the sympathy in Richard's eyes. It was what he'd expected.

"He's alive. Alive, but barely."

"Jennifer?"

"Already on her way."

+++

It's amazing what a simple wedding band can do. Neither Jennifer or Richard could get past the valkyrie at the desk, but after one look at Rodney she'd said:  
"They should've changed the law already." Rodney let the lie stand and followed the nurse to Sheppard's room. 

He was getting better at it; not everyone reacted well to the truth. John Sheppard was an exception in more ways than one. Rodney had known it when he married the man. 

+++

Sheppard lay unconscious on the bed, his hearing gone for now and body hidden under bandages. One of the them was too close to his heart.

_"What heart?"_ Rodney could hear John's voice say. _"You're already keeping it safe for me."_

More physical therapy for your already weak shoulder, "Rodney said to the room. "Congratulations, you're going to hate every minute of it."

_"You're stuck with me."_

"I know." Rodney gave a resigned sigh. "Why won't you let me forget and pretend just for a while?"

+++

"Your sister called."

Rodney opened and then closed his mouth. He turned back to his laptop, but Zelenka didn't take the hint.

"She wanted to know which AI we were using to generate the emails to her because clearly they weren't coming from you." The judgement in his voice was loud and clear.

"Isn't that ironic."

"No." 

Rodney glanced at this familiar version of his friend and feigned a tight smile.

"No, it isn't." 

"You promised to fix this," Zelenka said crossing his arms.

"I did no such thing. If I had, I would remember the lie."

Zelenka looked down through his glasses. "She's your sister."

"Well, I'm not her brother."

"Why don't you let her decide that? She already has the clearance."

"Don't you people think who you let sign that thing?" Rodney shouted out his frustration.

"It was your idea." 

"It always is."

"So, you'll talk to her?" Zelenka sounded victorious.

"Go away. I have work to do."

+++

"It's not that she wouldn't accept me. I know she would, in a heartbeat. She'd mock me thoroughly while at the same time mourn for her real brother. It's that telling her means I'm giving up on Jeannie, my sister, the one I left behind."

Rodney leaned back in the uncomfortable chair in the dark corner of Sheppard's hospital room.

"I don't know why I'm telling you this. You're not even listening."

Neither were the bugs. Rodney had made sure before speaking.

+++

"You were at the hospital again," Jennifer said over their lunch. "Is there any change?"

"I'd think you'd know before I did," Rodney said then stuffing his mouth with chicken. The lemon was exceptional today.

"Not everything shows up on a chart," she said while cutting her filet with surgical precision.

"No, it doesn't," Rodney agreed.

"It isn't wise what you're doing."

"No, it's not."

"Then why?"

"Because the rift is sealed. For once, Kavanaugh managed to take uncorrupted readings and both Radek and I confirmed the results. There's no going back for me. Not that way anyway."

You're still going to run the tests again, aren't you?"

"Right after lunch."

+++

Rodney lied and took a detour to the lab.

"I could really use your instincts right about now. Tell me which crystal to pull and which button to push to turn back the clock. I miss your face even if I don't miss the scar."

"You didn't tell me about the scar," a raspy voice said.

Rodney walked to the bed and pushed the water cup closer to Sheppard.

"What else didn't you tell me?"

"Heroes have scars. It's an occupational hazard."

Sheppard tried to snort but ended up gasping for breath for full two minutes.

"Scars lie."

"No, they don't. Yours won't."

Sheppard looked at Rodney confused.

"Jennifer borrowed something. You'll be as good as new. Better."

"Why?"

"I really don't miss the scar," Rodney lied.

+++

Halfway through his pudding Sheppard asked: "Did your sister call?"

"No. Why do you ask?" Rodney stopped typing.

"I recognised the look. I hav—had a brother." Rodney's mouth pulled askew recognising a lie.

"No. She didn't call." He looked down at this tablet. "She came knocking on the door and wouldn't go away."

"How did it go?" Sheppard was licking his spoon now.

"Badly."

"It's quite hard to convince someone you're not who they think you are when the only difference is your sexuality." Rodney looked at John. "She wants to meet you."

"Why?" The spoon hung from Sheppard's mouth.

"Because she can't meet my John."

"Well, that's not going to happen."

"No, it won't." Rodney shook his head in agreement. 

And if the scent of failure hung on the air, neither of them would admit it.

+++

"They're letting me out tomorrow."

"Congratulations."

"Thanks," Sheppard said slowly.

Rodney waited.

"My car—"

"Was the casualty of our cleaning crew. Collateral damage if you will." Rodney helpfully supplied.

"Oh."

"I'll bring you some clean clothes," Rodney continued almost cheerfully. "You don't need to walk out of here in bloodstains."

"Wouldn't be the first time," John said and saw Rodney freeze. "What?"

Rodney shook his head. "Just a flashback. That excuse didn't work for him and it won't work for you."

John stared at him from the rumpled bed.

"I'm glad you remember that I'm not him. Anything short of a scientific miracle won't make me into him."

"When you do that, you sound exactly like him."

Rodney put away his tablet, got up from the chair and walked to the window.

"It's such a cliché that the one difference between two John Sheppards is a career misstep. You both went back to someone you loved but he, my John, only paid with his heart and you with the whole of his—your—life. You gave up and wasted _everything_ whereas he went out to fight even harder for himself and his team."

"For you?"

"Isn't that what I said?" Rodney glanced over his shoulder. "I am his team. There are other hangers on and family members, but I'm always by his side."

"Except when you're not."

A cold front swept across the room.

"Except when a perfectly safe experiment goes awry because another experiment in an alternate universe goes spectacularly wrong. And I blame you for that." Rodney turned his furious gaze at John.

"I wasn't there," John protested.

"Exactly. You weren't there to tease and mock your McKay, to goad him on, to make him strive to exceed himself. Instead you let him fail because you had failed." Rodney was running out of breath and instead of running out of words or letting John lend him some, he walked out of the room.

+++

Rodney wasn't back the next day, but John's bag of cash was. Next to it lay the uniform of a successful businessman and a note: "This armor will do you more good in this life than in the other."

John wore the suit but kept the tie in his pocket.

+++

"I'm sorry," the voice on the other end said.

"No, I am. I lied. If I hadn't, it would've sounded like I wanted to leave that life. Like I wanted to leave him." Rodney hung his head and breathed.

"Trust me, it wouldn't have. Coffee?"

"God yes."

+++

"Do you always put that much sugar in your coffee?"

"Will you stop it? It's my first for the day. Not the coffee, the sugar," Rodney's voice trailed off. 

"He does that to you a lot." It wasn't a question, but Rodney answered anyway.

"Yeah. The longer we live the more paranoid he becomes. Not of flying nukes to Wraith motherships or something equally terrifying, but of sugar and hard fats." Rodney stopped and turned to face John. "And can we not?"

"Not talk about your John Sheppard? I thought that's why you decided to talk to me in the first place." John contemplated his cup giving Rodney as much space as he could. It didn't quell his curiosity, though.

"Yes. Come on." Rodney picked a table by the window at the tiny coffeeshop and waited for John to find his feet.

Rodney's hands were still.

"Your uncanny resemblance to my husband is why I took a chance on you with the truth, but it's not why we're here now."

If John had had any expectations on hearing that particular confession from Rodney McKay, the rapid exhalation took them with it.

"Actually, I'm not sure we're married anymore. He probably thinks me dead and once he accepts it—What?"

"If you spoke true and there's little difference between him and me, he'll never forget you or give you up as dead," John said. It was weird to imagine an universe where he'd earned the love of someone like Rodney McKay. He was jealous of himself. 

"We weren't supposed to talk about him," Rodney said suddenly.

"I think you need to; you need to get it out."

Rodney took his coffee to go.

+++

John found Rodney on a bench overlooking a hotel pool. 

"A bit too expensive for my taste."

Rodney snorted. "Short on cash already? You never cease to surprise me."

Neither smiled for long.

"I think he knew before he left," John said into his hands.

_What?_ John could hear the unvoiced question. He looked over the water.

"The last night we spent together, he told me all his plans for us for when we'd get home. Damn the consequences. A house, a puppy, a wedding. We never talked of such things. Never. I tried once and he shut me down faster than a bullet." John turned to look at Rodney's profile. 

"But that night he spoke out all his dreams as if he knew it was his last chance. He didn't tell me not to fly after him—"

"Because he knew you too well for that," Rodney said.

"No," John said, "because he feared his own death more than mine."

Rodney turned to look at John. "He didn't love you."

"He did."

"But—"

"Not all loves are equal, Rodney."

"Then why would you throw away your life for him?"

"You tell me," John said, waited a beat, stood up and walked away.

+++ 

"I can't get back." Rodney turned his glass in his hands. "The original rift is sealed never to be opened again and nothing was left to anchor this universe to that one. There are—ways I could try, but I might as well spend the rest of my life flicking the buttons on a remote where the channels are nanometers apart." Rodney showed John one of his grins. "I'm dead."

This wasn't right. John wanted to reach out and anchor Rodney to this universe if not this exact place, and to him, but words would have to do.

"Are you sure there's no way back?"

"If there were, I would've found it by now. Or Zelenka would have. Or the idiot who pulled us here and disappeared himself would have. After three years it's time to face the facts. I can't get back the life I had."

"Maybe not, but you're not dead. And you don't strike me as the type who gives up before they stop breathing."

Rodney shook his head. "What if I do get back only to find out he's moved on?" Seeing John's protest forming, Rodney added; "Moved on with the other me. He can turn any man gay. Has before."

"Then," John said, "I guess you're stuck with me."

Rodney spilled his drink all over the table.

"That's an interesting way to drink your beverage. Tell me how it tastes," John said sipping from his bottle.

+++

Zelenka found Rodney at the lab staring at the quantum mirror.

"When did you arrange for this to be delivered?" he asked.

"When we stepped through the gate," Rodney answered.

"And does it work?"

"Of course it does," Rodney said genuinely irritated.

Zelenka brought a chair closer and sat next to Rodney.

"And?"

"And there are an infinite number of universes. If I pick even the slightly wrong one, I could destroy more than I already have."

"That hasn't stopped us before," Zelenka pointed out and took the controller from Rodney.

"It should have. Just think of what we lost."

"How does leaving a mess we created untidied fix what we did?"

"It doesn't."

"Exactly." Zelenka turned on the mirror and started skimming universes. Rodney waited for a heartbeat.

"Give me that. You don't have a clue where to start."

+++

"You look tired," John said handing a bottle to Rodney and sitting next to him on the hood of his new car. "Did the integrals stage a mutiny or something?"

"I've been channel surfing."

John swallowed his bitter beer.

"Another C.S.I. rerun or?"

"A quantum mirror for alternative universes."

"Oh." John ignored the view over the canyon in favor of his boots instead.

"Home sweet home?"

"Not yet." Rodney took a sip. "Zelenka keeps resetting the dial and every time I think we're getting closer he points out a detail I never noticed. I'm starting to wonder if I'd recognise home should we find it."

"Things change in three years," John said.

"So do people."

"I told you before, he wouldn't forget you."

"Not him," Rodney turned to face John. "I have changed."

John felt Rodney's gaze on his lips and reached for a lifeline.

"Thanks for the car."

"What?" Rodney started back.

"You salvaged my ill-gotten gains and settled my debts. Thank you."

"It was nothing."

"It really wasn't."

"Money means nothing to me," Rodney said.

"I know, but it means a lot to me."

"Says the man who walked away from a fortune."

"Well, you know its worth better when you don't have it." John looked up willing Rodney to understand.

No one called Dr. Rodney McKay stupid, not without lying. With determination Rodney leaned closer and tasted. Before John could react, Rodney had pulled back.

"That's different."

John's heart sank at the words, but then Rodney had stolen his beer to put it on the ground next to his own and was holding John's face between his hands.

"You can stop me anytime you want," Rodney said and kissed John again.

+++

All the other worlds ceased to exist for John and he hoped it was the same for Rodney.

"One night?" Rodney asked and John nodded.

"Where?"

"Just find me a bed."

+++

John held Rodney's ring between his fingers and twisted it.

"I was the lucky one," Rodney said, "he could have picked anyone and yet he settled." Rodney felt John's arms tighten around him as he rested his head against John's heart.

_No. No. No._ John's heart beat. Rodney closed his eyes.

"I never told him my greatest fear but he knew it anyway."

"His death."

Rodney nodded.

+++

Zelenka was staring at the same channel for a third day in a row.

"Home sweet home."

"I didn't think we'd find it this quickly," Radek said.

"Neither did I." Rodney's fists were in his pockets and his shoulders were hunched. "To tell the truth, I didn't think we'd ever find it."

"Ready to go? We have to do it now, before they stop us." Radek jumped out of his chair.

"If they haven't figured out the fixed feed in the last five days, they won't do it in the next five minutes."

"Rodney?"

"I'm not going. This is my home now."

"After everything, you're giving up now?" Zelenka sounded incredulous.

"This is my home now," Rodney repeated slowly. He pulled the ring off his finger and handed it to Radek. "Tell him—whatever you think best. The Rodney McKay he loved doesn't exist anymore. Hasn't for a long time."

"Whatever it is—"

"You can't fix it in five minutes, Radek. Go, my friend. Go home and be happy."

Rodney still felt the hug when he closed the portal.

+++

The bed swung under Rodney's weight.

"Morning." John turned on his back. "What will we do today?"

Rodney was wearing a fond smile John hadn't seen before. 

"I thought we could talk to my sister."


End file.
